Fully Orientable Viewfinder

After finally receiving my Kinoptik 5.7mm Tegea Lens, i am having a bit of a hard time framing up my compositions with my Eclair ACL.

I like keeping the camera low to the ground, shooting slightly upwards... but my viewfinder makes this extremely difficult without shooting "blind."

I have the Kinoptik Orientable viewfinder, but the viewfinder seems hardly "fully orientable."

It seems all i can do is rotate the viewfinder on a horizontal axis (and i'm not sure how this would ever help you with a shot, seeing that the standard position for over the shoulder shooting seems like the only functional way to orient the viewfinder.)

OK, long story short... do any viewfinders exist for the ACL that allow you to tilt the viewfinder on a vertical axis, a la the XL1 and XL2 viewfinder?

For both of these viewfinders the image rotates when you move the viewfinder. So, shooting low you probably are seeing at the image rotated 90 degrees on it's side? The orientable one has a dial near where it attaches to the camera body that lets you rotate the image right-side up. It is kinda funky, but using that dial you can "correct" the image so it's right-side-up no matter where you position the viewfinder.

I have one of each of these viewfinders. when I shoot a really low shot with the non-orientable one, I actually hold the camera so the lens is pointed directly to my left and look straight down into the viewfinder sideways (just rotate the eye cup). That way I can see the image right side up. It definitely is not the ideal situation, but that's how i do it, unless your brain can frame a shot sideways - which mine cannot!

I actually have neither of those viewfinders. Those are both Angeneiux viewfinders if i am correct... mine is a Kinoptik.

ah, it probably would help if I had read your post a little closer. I've never tried the Kinoptik but from what I've read there is a version that auto rotates the image so you don't have to deal with turning a dial.

I use the orientable Angeneiux viewfinder with my NPR, which I believe has the same mounting thread as the ACL. Cinema Products also made an orientable viewfinder which some people prefer to the Angeneiux. The Kinoptik was always something of a dog - sure you can position the viewfinder for a better angle but what's the use if the image doesn't remain upright?

Call Whitehouse AV, Optical Electro House or Bernie at super16inc.com - if you have a question about an Eclair camera they will probably have the answer you are looking for...

I use the orientable Angeneiux viewfinder with my NPR, which I believe has the same mounting thread as the ACL.

The mounting threads are different, but Eclair and CP made adapters.

At Sawyer, we had an Angie orientable mounted on an ACL using the CP adapter.The Angie O is longer the the standard ACL finder.With the Angie O, the ACL with 400' mabalanced nicely on the edge of the shoulder.